Emailed on July 17, 2020 in The Friday Forward

This week SiriusXM confirmed it’s buying podcasting company Stitcher for $325 million, the biggest podcast deal in history. 
Stitcher operates a popular podcasting app, produces shows under its Earwolf and Stitcher brands, and sells advertising spots across 250+ shows. 

Sirius will also get the podcast ad company Stitcher bought a few years back, Midroll Media. But it needs to figure out how Midroll will sync up with AdsWizz, the podcast ad tech company it got in 2018 when it acquired Pandora (which also streams podcasts).
Sirius is trying to compete against Spotify, Apple, and iHeartMedia. Apple was first to the podcast space, but Spotify is muscling its way into becoming the Spotify of podcasts. 

• Over the last few months, Spotify has ramped things up to 1.5x speed, recruiting big names like Joe Rogan, Kim Kardashian West, The Ringer, and DC Comics to its platform. And in June, it improved advertising offerings. 

Big picture: Buying Stitcher adds one of the most prominent names in podcasting to Sirius’s portfolio and rounds out its in-house services for producers.